PHILADELPHIA — There were reasons to think that 2012 was less of an aberration and more of a harbinger for the future of the Philadelphia Phillies.

However, it is difficult to fathom that anyone, anywhere, thought the 2013 Phils would sink this low, to a point where they are inarguably the worst team in the National League, and only by the saving grace of the Houston Astros can they avoid the title of worst team in the majors.

Sunday evening saw the freefalling Phils (52-65) lose their 11th straight road game and 17th of their last 20, as Stephen Strasburg barely broke a sweat sawing through nine innings for the first shutout of his career in a 6-0 win for the Nationals.

“It’s been tough — the toughest since I’ve been managing in the major leagues,” said Charlie Manuel, still stuck on 999 career managerial wins. “It has been the toughest stretch we’ve ever had, I’m pretty sure of it. I don’t know what you want to do about it.”

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The Phils’ 4-17 record since the All-Star break is by far the worst in the National League, and only Houston’s 4-18 mark as the American League’s laughingstock keeps Manuel’s team from being baseball’s doormat.

That is zero consolation for a team made up of young players who don’t know any better, and veterans who never have experienced humiliation of this magnitude.

Jimmy Rollins, who had one of the four hits the Phils managed off Strasburg Sunday, but has just three runs scored in the Phils’ last 18 games, never has endured an extended stretch of bad baseball like this in his 13 big-league seasons. So, even he and other veterans are responsible for steering the team away from the point of unraveling out there, it’s not like he has experience dealing with this unkempt ball of yarn that represents the fabric of a season gone awry.

“I don’t think I’ve had a stretch like this either,” Rollins said, an unusual sobriety from a man whose swagger used to define the franchise as it climbed the ladder of success. “We’ve had stretches where we’ve lost some games in a row, but we found a way to put some wins up in a row after that. It isn’t happening right now.

“We always found a way to fight, a way to scratch out a win. Why that isn’t happening? I don’t know. You can’t put a finger on it.

“There is a different crop of guys, a different talent level. They’re here because the management feels they have what it takes to win. It’s just a matter of getting them to believe it, and putting up some wins. When that happens, they will start to believe it.”

It is true that the players in the lineup Sunday whose presence wasn’t supposed to be a factor this season if the Phils had been healthy and competent — Darin Ruf, Cody Asche and Michael Martinez — were a combined 0-for-9 with six strikeouts and completely overwhelmed by Strasburg, who struck out 10 and walked one in a 99-pitch gem.

But it hasn’t been all about young players making the mistakes. Rollins hasn’t picked up his game after a lackluster first half. Chase Utley, during a ridiculous three-run fifth by the Nationals that featured a couple of infield hits, threw home on a grounder by Wilson Ramos with the bases loaded and no outs. He could have turned an easy double play and sacrificed the run for an exit path from the inning for Kyle Kendrick. Instead, Utley threw home, and it was a low, awful, weak throw that nearly hit Ramos’ bat and that catcher Erik Kratz couldn’t dig out for the force.

“You start trying too hard and (feel) you have to make plays,” Manuel said. “This is a game where you do it because you want to do it and because you can. Not because you ‘have to.’ That creates tension and pressure, and thinking. The fear of failure creeps in on you.”

The frustration was clear in Kendrick’s face. He allowed 11 hits — all of them singles, few of them solid — before exiting in the middle of that clownish fifth inning.

“I can’t show that out there,” Kendrick said, “but it’s been frustrating. Battle through it — that’s all I can do.”

Former Phillie Jayson Werth, who for the past six weeks has been playing his best ball since signing a $126 million contract to join the Nationals, had three more hits to push his season average to .328. Four other Nats had multiple-hit games — and this was a team that was 6-13 in the second half before the Phillies came to town.

Although no player uses the word “stunned” in the clubhouse, the Phillies’ faces tend to say it for them.

“It’s different,” Rollins said. “I don’t think you’re ever shocked because you know that these things can happen. But it isn’t anything you want to go through.

“It’s not fun. The good thing is that we have a good group of guys and we enjoy being around each other. We just have to learn how to enjoy winning on the field, and that hasn’t happened.”